The boss of ACT waste said on ABC 666 this morning that 70% of the e-waste from Canberra will be processed in Australia. What happens to the other 30%, especially the toxic stuff like lead?
All of a sudden there seems to be a rush to secure e-waste. Perhaps this is so the rare earth minerals in it can be recovered as an alternate source to getting them from China who have stitched up the global sources and supply of the minerals for China alone.
There is big money in e-waste; ABS plastic is worth $700 per tonne granulated and cleaned,
solder is worth around $5000 per tonne, circuit boards are 30% by weight copper – some even more.
Then there are the rare earths in mobile phones and LCD screens
They aren’t doing it for the copper and steel alone and it comes at no cost to them!

Or were Dick Smith and HN just holding onto all their old stuff and dumped this morning?

Well, 1400 items making 35 tonnes would be a 25kg average… which seems a little heavy unless a very high percentage of those items were 80cm CRT TVs (our 80cm CRT TV weighs way more than that). Even a 17″ CRT monitor only comes in at 15-20 kg, and I imagine a fair few of he items were much liter.

On the other hand, 3.5 tonnes would only be a 2.5kg average which is obviously not right. My guess is they filled containers with a max capacity of 35 tonnes (full volume wise, not full total weigh carrying ability wise.